Saving Fish From Drowning

  “Are you ready?” the safari-hatted woman said. “Today’s new challenge . . .” And she told them that holes would be punched into their canoes’ hulls, to simulate an attack by a hippopotamus, and they would have to plug these leaks with any material they could find, hope it held fast, then paddle one hundred meters upstream, where they could obtain the fresh water and food necessary to sustain them for the next three days. “If you don’t make it,” she warned, “you’re literally and figuratively sunk.” She gave a rundown on the voracious creatures that lay in wait in the waters—rib-crunching crocodiles, flesh-nibbling fish, poisonous swimming snakes, and the most dangerous creature of them all, the people-hating hippos. The camera zoomed in on each contestant’s face, and captured the fast-blinking eyes of the fearful, the pressed lips of the determined, the slack jaws of those who already knew they were doomed.

  Bennie empathized with their fears and public humiliation. When they scratched at an itch, he did, too. When they swallowed in horror, he swallowed as well. They looked like prisoners on a chain gang, he thought. I should tell them we are in the same boat and should join forces. He walked closer and then caught himself. What was he doing? This is TV, you dope, it isn’t real. His glazed eyes returned to the screen, and a minute later, his logic flipped once again, so that he was operating under the reasoning of dreams. It’s a reality show, he told himself, and that means it is real. The people are real, the boats are real, the holes are real. The only thing that separates their reality from mine is a piece of glass. If I can just get them to see past the screen. . . . He threw his arms in the air, and this sudden action was enough to jolt him out of the delusion. Stop thinking crazy, he chastised himself. But like a person pulled irresistibly toward sleep, he gradually fell back into this semi-dream state. He sent a message with the power of his mind. Look at me, please. God damn it, look at me! I’m stuck in the jungle, too. Look at me!

  I knew how he felt. Since my death, I have been overwhelmed with a frustration that alternates with despair. Imagine it: your consciousness separated from others by an invisible barrier that was erected in the blink of an eye. And now the eye no longer blinks. It never will again.

  In Bennie’s porous mind, he was now advising the teams: Tear up your clothes, mix them with mud to make a ball—no, no, not the coconut hair, forget that, and don’t pick up the thatch, it’s not going to bunch up tight enough. You idiots! I’m the leader! You’re supposed to listen to me. . . . His disobedient team had just put their boat into the water, when a news crawl floated along the bottom of the screen: “Special report: More on the mystery of the eleven missing tourists in Myanmar.”

  Bennie was amazed that other tourists were in their same predicament. The only difference: eleven instead of twelve. Wait a second. We are only eleven. He blinked hard to push out the brain skitter. Was it merely wishful thinking? A hallucinatory manifestation? He ran closer to the TV, blocking everybody’s view. But now the news crawl had disappeared.

  “Did you see that?” he cried.

  Loot ordered Bennie to get out of the way. No one in the tribe had read the words at the bottom, not even Black Spot, who could pick out one letter at a time with great effort. These English words had run across the bottom of the screen as fast as a beetle when you overturned its home.

  The crawl came back, slithering like a neon snake. “Special report: More on the mystery of the eleven missing tourists in Myanmar.”

  Bennie gasped. “Hey, guys!” he yelled. “Get over here, quick! We’re going to be on TV!”

  “What’s he imagining now?” Dwight said softly. They had been taken in by other fantasies of Bennie’s. Claims that the bridge was up (which it indeed had been when Black Spot went for more supplies). Shouts that he saw people on the other side of the rift (which he indeed had, when Black Spot and Grease returned). And now he was saying they were on Darwin’s Fittest? Poor Bennie, ever since his seizure, he had been coming apart, they concluded. They tried to humor him, and they also feared the possibility that others among them would go insane.

  Bennie shouted to them again. “The news,” he gasped. “We’re on the news!”

  “Your turn,” Moff told Roxanne, and she sighed and went to Bennie to put to rest this latest false hope. If they didn’t, he would not stop. But a few seconds later she yelled back, “Get over here! Quick!” They nearly fell over one another to reach the television.

  “Look!” Bennie shouted, dancing up and down. “I told you so.” An anchor for an Australian network was saying that new footage about the Missing Eleven had just been received. My friends stared hard at the screen. But what came on next was a letdown. A travel piece on Egypt or something. A figure was climbing to the top of a pyramid. He was scanning more of these pyramids, which stretched out toward the horizon. The camera zoomed in on a well-groomed man with dark hair and silver temples. He looked uncannily familiar.

  “Harry!” Marlena shrieked.

  “The aching splendor,” Harry was now saying in a dreamy voice. He looked off into the distance toward a panorama of more than two thousand domes and spires. “To see such stoic magnificence”—and he turned to the camera—“reminds me of my brave friends. Once they are found, and I know that will be soon, I shall bring them here to glorious Bagan, where we can enjoy the sunrises and sunsets together.”

  Heidi laughed and then squealed. “He’s talking about us! We’re going back!” Moff gave her a happy squeeze.

  “Omigod!” Wendy blubbered. “We’re saved! We’re going home!”

  “Turn it up,” Moff said calmly, belying his nervous anticipation. Dwight grabbed the remote control from Loot’s hands. The people of No Name Place wondered what had made the Younger White Brother’s friends so excited. Only Black Spot suspected, and the knot in his stomach tightened. Had they offended a Nat? Why did they need to endure so many trials?

  “We have some very, very good news,” the Missing Eleven heard Harry say in his best television voice of authority. A cheer went up among my friends. High fives were exchanged. Bennie was already thinking about hugging Timothy, taking a luxurious bath, then plop-ping into their plumped-up bed. The camera panned out to show Harry speaking to a Burmese reporter. “Our search team,” Harry said, “has a new lead, a promising one, in Mandalay. It seems that a craftsman of papier-mâché marionettes saw something suspicious, as did two monks. They all reported seeing a tall gentleman with long hair tied back in a ponytail and wearing khaki short pants, and with him were a young Eurasian boy and girl. The marionette maker said he spotted them at the top of Mandalay Hill, and the monks glimpsed them later that same day at Mahamuni Pagoda.”

  The Burmese reporter cut in: “This man with a ponytail, this is a description of your friend, isn’t it?”

  “Correct,” Harry was seen answering with authority. “That could very well be Mark Moffett and his son, Rupert, along with Esmé, the daughter of my fiancée, Marlena Chu, who is also missing.” Four photos flashed up.

  “That’s me!” Esmé cried, and then instantly she pouted, saying, “I hate that picture.”

  Moff stamped his foot. “Shit! You blasted idiot, Harry! I’m here in bloody nowhere, not in Mandalay.”

  “Fiancée,” Marlena whispered to herself.

  “The worrisome part,” Harry went on, “is that they were led around by two men—”

  “But they were not Burmese,” the reporter cut in, “as we confirmed earlier.”

  “Yes, that’s right. The witnesses said they appeared to be Indian or Thai, maybe even Chinese, in any case, definitely not Burmese, because, as you so astutely pointed out, the Burmese witnesses said they couldn’t understand a thing the thugs were saying. But what they did note, interestingly enough, is that they were speaking in gruff tones, and Moff—or rather, the man we think is Mark Moffett—plus the two youngsters, simply obeyed as if they were under the influence of something. The marionette maker and monks said it was a spell cast by Nats, which some Burmese believe are disturbed spirits who are
very out of sorts because of a violent death centuries ago.”

  “Yes, they are very common here,” the reporter said.

  “Well, I believe they might have been drugged,” Harry continued, “which is a more rational explanation. They were reported to have the glazed look of heroin users—”

  The reporter broke in: “Heroin is strictly forbidden in Myanmar. The penalty for heroin using or selling is death.”

  “Yes, indeed. And none of my friends are of that ilk, absolutely not, I can guarantee that. But that is precisely why we are concerned about the people who were with them, who might have possibly drugged them. Regardless, this sighting represents a huge break for us, huge, and that’s where we’re going to focus our efforts over the next few days, in Mandalay, atop the hill, in the pagoda, anywhere our search team feels we should investigate based upon creditable sources of information. Creditable, that’s the key. The government of Myanmar has been extremely helpful in that regard. As soon as I climb down this incredible specimen of Burmese history and architecture, we’re off to Mandalay. In the meantime, if anyone sees anything else of importance, we ask them to call the special Bear Witness Hotline number on the screen.”

  Harry beckoned to a woman with two dogs. He vigorously scratched the neck of the black Labrador until the dog’s back leg started thumping. “That’s my little sausage,” Harry said, and then bent down to the other member of the search team, a border collie. “Lushy-mush,” he cooed with lips pursed for kissing. Before the dog could slurp him with her slick tongue, Harry deftly pulled back. “These beauties are better than the FBI,” he gloated. “Search-and-rescue dogs, infallible noses, with a work ethic based on a simple reward of fetch. And this gorgeous lady here is their fearless trainer.” The camera zoomed in on a woman in a perky shift of pink and yellow stretch cotton that clung to her thin, youthful body. “Saskia Hawley. She trained them herself,” said Harry, “and did a top-notch job, if I say so myself.”

  “Using techniques you taught me and many thousands of others,” she added generously, batting her eyelashes comically.

  Harry gave his best bashful but charming little-boy smile and then turned to the camera: “That’s all for now. We’ll join you next from Mandalay. What do you say, Saskia? Lush and Topper, are you ready to work? Let’s be going!” The dogs leapt up with tails twirling as fast as helicopter rotors. Saskia smiled at Harry, a little too adoringly, Marlena thought. With a soft command from Saskia, the dogs shot forward, sniffing the ground as they led the way.

  My friends and the Lord’s Army folk watched as Harry and Saskia strode side by side into a blindingly beautiful sunset. Their figures receded, and the camera panned out and did a slow fade to black, as if all hope had been extinguished.

  The news anchor broke in: “For those of you tuning in late, that was a tape sent by TV Myanmar International, with Harry Bailley . . .”

  For several seconds, my friends in No Name Place were too stunned to speak. “I can’t believe it,” Roxanne finally said in a low monotone.

  Wendy started to cry, and leaned on Wyatt’s shoulder.

  Marlena wondered who that woman was, the one Harry had spoken to with such frank familiarity. Why had he called her “gorgeous”? Why the googly eyes? Was she a fiancée, too? She realized how little she knew about Harry.

  Vera sat up straight. “Let’s not be pessimistic. This is good news. They assume we are still alive, and they’re looking for us. Let’s talk about what this means and what we should do.”

  And so they struggled to do as Vera suggested. Late into the night, they discussed the best way to let their potential rescuers know their whereabouts. They also contemplated how to ensure the safety of the tribe. Perhaps the Lajamees could hide in the rainforest, and the eleven could tell their rescuers that they had found this abandoned camp. Or they could simply insist the Lajamees were heroes and should be protected from retribution.

  Dwight sprang to his feet. “Well, now that we have a plan,” he said, “I’m going to bushwhack my way out of here. Anyone else want to come along?”

  “Don’t be ridiculous,” Roxanne said.

  Dwight ignored her. “If I can get out of this rainforest to an open area where people can see us from above, that would be far better than waiting for God knows how long.”

  “Be serious,” Roxanne said.

  He did not look at her. The others shrugged, and Dwight strode away in disgust. Roxanne thought, Why did he have to be that way—and just when the two of them seemed to be getting along?

  My friends now switched to a conversation that reflected their new optimism. First thing when she reached home, Marlena said, would be a long, hot bath. Roxanne said she would run the shower for a sinfully long hour to flush out all the grit that had adhered to her skin. Wendy wanted to get a massage, a haircut, a manicure-pedicure, and buy makeup, underwear, and socks. Bennie was going to buy all new suits because he had lost nearly twenty pounds. The malaria still came back in waves, making it impossible for him to eat much. But what a surprise Timothy would have when he saw Bennie’s trim physique. Heidi wanted to lie in clean sheets. Moff wanted to lie in the clean sheets with her.

  They were thinking of the future, the small things, the little luxuries. The big hope was already taken care of. Everybody was looking for them.

  ELSEWHERE IN THE CAMP, the conversation was more solemn. Black Spot had recounted to his people what the tourists had seen on television. The man Harry Bailley had started his own television show. It was not in the jungles of Dawin’s Fittest, but here in Burma. He was searching for the Younger White Brother and his followers and had elevated them to TV stars. Black Spot was sure the SLORC soldiers were helping the man to look for them. No one else would be allowed.

  An old grandmother lamented, “We might as well jump into the cook pot right now and boil ourselves down to a soup of dead bones.”

  Salt agreed. “They are now bait for the tiger. And we’re the ones who will be eaten.”

  “No more talk of soups and tigers,” Black Spot said. “We need to make a plan to escape to another hiding place.”

  “The Younger White Brother will protect us when we go,” Black Spot’s wife said.

  Some people nodded, but a man with a knee stump countered, “He’s the one who got us into trouble. And what sign do we have that he is truly the Reincarnated One? The card and the book—perhaps he stole them.”

  Other doubters nodded. Soon they were arguing over whether the boy really was the Reincarnated One, the Younger White Brother. A true Younger Brother was supposed to make them stronger, not weaker. He was supposed to make them invisible. “But we are now more visible than ever,” a man complained.

  Black Spot shot to his feet. That was the answer! The Younger White Brother had come to make them not invisible but visible, seen by the whole world. He recalled for the tribe their wishful dream of having their own TV show. That’s why the Younger White Brother had come with ten people and a moviemaking camera to record their story. They would show the world they were braver and had endured more hardships than those on Darwin’s Fittest. Their perils were real. People would want them to survive. Their show would be number one, week after week, number one among wombats and kiwis, Americans and Burmese, too popular to cancel. The path had been placed right before their eyes: all they needed was to have Harry Bailley feature them on his show.

  The little twin god Loot stood, removed his smoky cheroot, and extended both arms. His glazed eyes flew upward, and he cried out, “Let us pray.”

  My friends were still riveted to the TV, ready for it to illuminate their faces with further news of themselves and how they were doing. Those who were strong alternated in pedaling the bicycle to recharge whichever battery was not in use. Their faces were turned in one direction, and thus occupied, they did not notice Black Spot entering the strangler fig abode where Roxanne and Dwight kept their belongings. They did not see him remove the camcorder from the small backpack and take out the tape, nor did they
notice him leave the camp with Grease, Salt, and Fishbones, and race down the path toward the chasm.

  Fishbones stood watch for any of the foreigner guests who might be approaching. This was not likely, since it was dark and the friends of the Younger White Brother feared the split in the earth. Grease and Salt looped the rope around the tree-trunk winch and pulled until the bridge was raised high enough for them to grab the lines and fasten them to the tree stumps. Black Spot and Grease scurried across. Salt and Fishbones lowered the bridge. They would wait for their compatriots to return to bring it up again. By then it would be morning.

  NO NAME PLACE was now a happy campground for its visitors. Hooting and laughter were heard at all hours of the day. The Americans danced around the TV set. The tribe sat more quietly on their mats, turning to look at whichever foreigner had his or her face shown on the screen.

  My friends were relieved to find that Walter had not perished in the chasm after all. He was in a hospital with amnesia, caused by a bump on the head from a falling rock in the pagoda he was climbing while searching for Rupert. “See what can happen when others go looking for you?” Moff chastised his son. “Others are affected by what you do.”

  In the morning, GNN televised a parade that the city of Mayville, North Dakota, had put on to show support for Wyatt’s safe return. Children in yellow knitted caps and fat snowsuits rode in sleds pulled by their mothers, who also wore yellow. A trio of men, expelling clouds as they laughed and talked, held a large banner that said: “Mayville’s 1,981 Folks Are Praying for Our Native Son.” In the May-Port CG high school auditorium, yet another bake sale was going on, the fourth in the past week, with goods sold by the teachers. Hotcakes decorated with sugary yellow bows sold like hotcakes, and behind the tables a huge banner read: “American Crystal Sugar Company Wishes Our Best to the Fletcher Family.”